Change the conversation

shift the experience

When we hear kids say any variation of “I hate school,” what’s the response?

Often it’s something along the lines of:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, all kids say that.

Well, I didn’t like it either, kid, but I survived and you will, too.

You may not like it, but you have to go anyway.

Sound familiar?

Right. Therein lies the problemâ€Ĥ

As a society we have come to accept K-12 education as is, in the way it’s always been done—a system that hasn’t changed in 100 years—even though kids express frustration and dissatisfaction with their educational experiences on a regular basis.

 

School no longer works for how our children learn now and will work and live in the future.

While we don’t expect all kids to love school, imagine a day when our education system truly supports ALL kids—no matter who they are, where they are, or how that learning is taking place?

 

What if instead of accepting things as they are, we said NO MORE to the idea of "I hate school"?

 

So where do we start?

â€Ĥwith your child, with your student, with any kid who’s a part of your life in some way and enrolled in a school of any kind—public, private, charter, homeschool, full-time online, remote learning environment.

If you’re hearing some version of “I hate school,” the place to start is to ask:

Why?

Once we understand why, kids dislike school or are downright hating on it, then we can understand where there are opportunities to do things differently.

And when we hear kids' ideas for doing things differently, we know how we can shift their experience of school and help them foster a love of learning that transcends the classroom and informs the future of our society.

If you’d like help navigating the "I hate school" conversation and what to do next, we invite you to download our free resource, School Shift Toolkit.